


Against the World

by inkheights



Series: Haikyuu!! Rare Pair Week 2020 [4]
Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Alternate Universe - Arranged Marriage, Alternate Universe - Royalty, Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, HQrarepairweek2020, Haikyuu!! Rare Pair Week 2020 Day 4, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Minor Character Death, Non-Explicit Sex, Past Kageyama Tobio/Tsukishima Kei - Freeform, Voyeurism, this makes it sound so spicy but it's not fr
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-01
Updated: 2020-05-01
Packaged: 2021-03-02 05:22:15
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,095
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23939848
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/inkheights/pseuds/inkheights
Summary: Wakatoshi will not deny that the world is a cruel place. All men are slaves to the world’s bidding. This is a fact. A natural law. It does not need to be justified because it justis.Like him, Tsukishima Kei knows his role in the world. He is a piece, a pretty pawn delivered from a black kingdom to a white one, to blur the edges and make them gray. His part here is a crown prince and Tsukishima’s is a crown consort-to-be. There is nothing less and nothing more to make of it and they both understand that.But unlike Wakatoshi, Tsukishima Kei is a paradox.
Relationships: Tsukishima Kei/Ushijima Wakatoshi
Series: Haikyuu!! Rare Pair Week 2020 [4]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1720228
Comments: 14
Kudos: 140





	Against the World

**Author's Note:**

> Day 4 entry for Haikyuu!! Rare Pair Week 2020! (ushitsuki will be a little more ooc here because the alternative universe affected them and because i am trash.)
> 
> ...I hope you enjoy reading. 😔 Please leave me feedback!

Wakatoshi will not deny that the world is a cruel place.

It is oppressive and unforgiving. It will give you a task, a duty to fulfill, and you will submit to its commands or it will devour you whole and spit out your bones.

Those in the streets will say he’s one of the lucky ones. He lives in a castle with a thick roof over his head, a perpetual fire to keep him warm in his chambers. He’s bound to sit on a throne— _the_ throne—someday, and with this comes the promise that he can do whatever he wants and get away with it.

Wakatoshi disagrees.

He avows that people are not born equal, but all men are slaves to the world’s bidding. This is a fact. A natural law. It does not need to be justified because it just _is_. And he had made his peace with it since the day he had witnessed his brother’s body being carried by the river, skin brittle and cold to the touch. It was a lesson — for a man that had challenged the world and tried to choose his chains.

That was the day Wakatoshi was named Crown Prince; with the title came his understanding that there is simply no winning against fate.

And that fate brought Tsukishima Kei to him.

Like the young heir, he knows his role in the world. Tsukishima is a piece, a pretty pawn delivered from a black kingdom to a white one, to blur the edges and make them gray. He has accepted it, and has kept his pretty lips in a tight thin line as he is welcomed into the castle halls.

But unlike Wakatoshi, Tsukishima Kei is a paradox.

“You can let go now,” are the first words he ever says to him. It’s when they’re finally alone—in a balcony at a wing of the castle, a glass window away from the comities of the Shiratorizawa nobility.

Wakatoshi takes too long to comply and the blonde man takes it upon himself to jerk his arm away. He steps toward the railing and leans his elbows onto the marble.

“You are upset,” Wakatoshi tries, not knowing exactly what he should do in the situation.

His part here is a crown prince and Tsukishima’s is a crown consort-to-be. There is nothing less and nothing more to make of it and they both understand that.

“No.” He spits it out like poison. Wakatoshi does not understand why he’s lying.

“Do you disapprove of this engagement?” He stands next to the younger near the railing. The blonde’s lips are pursed.

“I believe the answer to that doesn’t matter.” Wakatoshi can almost taste the bitterness in the words. Maybe because they ring true. For him. For everyone.

“You are correct.” There is no point in denying it. This fact is inevitable, and they will encounter it again and again while they live.

Tsukishima hums low. They stand in the silence until the party calls for its celebrants.

The world is a cruel place and Tsukishima Kei tries to be more so.

In a manner of speaking, Wakatoshi can understand. One way to protect yourself from the sadistic whims of fate is to hurt others before they hurt you.

His refusals shift from ‘you don’t have to help me’ to ‘this is unnecessary’ to ‘you’re being a nuisance.’ Wakatoshi lets the quips bounce off of him all the same. They still have to put up the act of being developing lovers, after all.

(Frankly, the way his indifference aggravates the blonde amuses him. It’s juvenile, Wakatoshi admits, but it’s one of the things he enjoys that he _can_ do.)

Tsukishima Kei is guarded, but he has a soft heart. Wakatoshi doesn’t think anyone else notices but him.

There is only one time that he has witnessed the younger smile — _truly_ smile, without the intention of fooling an audience — and that is when Wakatoshi, by coincidence, catches sight of him receiving the clothing he wore at his arrival after it has been washed. It’s one of the few possessions he was allowed to bring from home, and it is clear to see that he cherishes it.

Wakatoshi finally sees him wear it again during afternoon tea with the king and queen.

It’s a deliberate occasion. To paint the picture of a family welcoming a new one into their household, so it is fitting that the newcomer wears clothing from his land.

Things go wrong when a new servant brings the tea.

Her clumsiness is barely concealed by her carefully expressionless face. He hopes his mother doesn’t notice, otherwise the servant will be dismissed right away with a fine that will keep her in debt even as her bones disintegrate underground.

His hopes are denied when the servant spills the tea.

Wakatoshi experiences whiplash for the first time in his life.

He catches the exact moment honey drains from Tsukishima’s eyes. The spill will stain. His face pales just a little. Wakatoshi thinks he won’t notice it if he wasn’t looking at the blonde’s face all this time.

Then the younger looks up to the servant, he sees the mortification in her eyes, and blurts out, “I’m sorry.”

Tsukishima is quick to put on a mask, superficial smile making its appearance. He apologizes to the royal couple and makes an assailable excuse of not getting enough sleep.

“My hand hit it by accident. Please let me change quickly and rejoin with you.” The twitch of his lips is barely there, but Wakatoshi is obviously staring.

“There’s no need for that, dear,” his father assures standing up. They all follow in response. “We’ve had a lovely afternoon with you. I think it will be fine to continue this some other time.”

His father has always been warm and understanding, but imposes his role — the world compels him to. The king and queen leave with their set of servants.

Once they’re out of sight, the girl kneels as she tries to wipe the black trousers down, hurriedly apologizing, the words not leaving her mouth fast enough. The blonde simply steals the cloth and wipes himself. He walks off without another word.

(Tsukishima doesn’t attend dinner that evening on the grounds of not feeling well. Wakatoshi persuades his father not to send the royal physician to his room.

Everything is back to normal the next day.)

Of course, Wakatoshi doesn’t fool himself into thinking he doesn’t feel anything at all for the blonde.

“Why do you keep going here?” The tone is chafed but Wakatoshi is used to that now.

He turns his head to Tsukishima, nestled between thick roots of the tree they lean on, book in hand. He’s not facing Wakatoshi but the brunette can imagine the look of distaste he often wears when he’s alone with the future king. It almost feels like a face reserved for him and him only, and that thought shouldn’t please him as much as it does.

“I like the east garden.” It’s the truth. Wakatoshi never is one for lying. The old alder tree at the center of the garden offers good shade, and the purple gladioli lining the concrete paths are beautiful. He likes it here.

“Okay, then visit when you’re done with your daily duties. Why do you have to keep going when it’s my time to read?”

Wakatoshi _does_ finish with his daily duties whenever he visits the garden on Thursdays. Though, he concedes that he makes conscious effort to finish early or cut back what he can to join the his fiancé on this schedule.

“I like you.”

The wind is gentle against his face so he imagines it floating his words around them. He hears Tsukishima make a noise that sounds like wheels skidding to a stop.

The next thing he knows, a book is landing squarely on his face. Tsukishima is brushing grass off his white trousers and storms off.

Wakatoshi has a fleeting thought that he should probably chastise the blonde — _impose his role_ — because the world will not approve of this behavior towards the crown prince of Shiratorizawa.

But he sees the red tips of Tsukishima’s ears even from a distance, his long strides that further drives in the fact that he’s flustered, and he realizes that the younger will not do this in front of the world. This is for him and him only.

He finds comfort in that. That maybe, Tsukishima just created a world where only the two of them exist.

Tsukishima makes his heart _truly_ soar when he tells him to call him Kei.

He offers a logical explanation, albeit flushed and very much aware of other implications of the request. He’s having a hard time referring to him as Ushijima in the castle, he always has to elaborate to the servants because ‘ _you have too many brothers and cousins in this stupid place_ ’. It’s only fair that he gets called by his first name too.

Wakatoshi smiles at him, and _Kei_ runs away.

The first time Wakatoshi touches Kei — _actually_ chooses to touch him, not out of necessity or any prerogative, and just because he wants to — the younger is silent. He lets it happen.

They’re on a walk around the west garden, where the paths are joint and the river can be seen from afar. They’ve been going on a lot of walks lately. They don’t talk much, neither having a lot he wants to share yet. But they still do it. He knows they both like it that way.

When they reach the halfway mark of the paths, Wakatoshi is struck with an urge. It’s not powerful or imperious, but he _wants_. And in the world that Kei created for them, he _can_.

His fingertips slide over the other’s inner arm, down to his palm, and then fitting their fingers in a way that makes Wakatoshi think this can be done forever. Kei’s fingers are slender where his are thick, but their hands are the same in length. It feels like a puzzle with two pieces.

 _Finally, finally together_.

But the world is still a cruel place, after all. And Tsukishima Kei is a paradox.

The first time Kei breaks his heart, it’s their wedding night.

He is holding his now-husband close as he pushes his hips forward. In the back of his mind, he regrets that they hadn’t done this sooner. He covers every part of him he can, feeling unwelcome eyes on his lover’s skin. The first time they are one and they don’t get the time to explore each other as much as he’d like—he has never damned anyone in his life as much as he has damned their consummation witnesses.

This is _his_ Kei, and this is _their_ world, and no one gets to get a glimpse of it but them. He engulfs the younger in his arms, mouths at his cheeks, and basks in the mewls that he thrusts out of him.

“‘Toshi. I’m...” Kei murmurs it in his ear, and he feels pride in how his lover must also be thinking his previous thoughts.

He puts emphasis on the depth of his thrusts instead of the pace, his husband tightening the legs around his waist and scratching his back and _there_ — the built up tension in Kei’s muscles drains out of him in a single thrust. Wakatoshi chases his own release.

The knot coiling in his stomach bursts inside his lover. He slumps over the younger’s figure and presses kisses on his shoulder. In his post-orgasmic haze, his inhibitions vanish and he whispers, low but not any less clear, “I love you, Kei.”

He doesn’t notice how Kei’s body goes rigid when he leans up for a kiss. His mouth is met with a knuckle over his husband’s mouth, and a haunted glint in his eyes.

Wakatoshi doesn’t know what happened. What he did.

He loves him. He does. And Kei loves him, too. He knows.

And yet, when the witnesses filter out of the room, Kei utters familiar words.

“You can let go now.”

(They sleep in the same bed that night, but Kei doesn’t let Wakatoshi touch him.

When he wakes up the next morning, the left side of the bed is cold.)

As if it’s some cheap magician’s trick, those words reset everything.

Kei doesn’t walk with him anymore, and he doesn’t show up under the alder tree the next Thursday. He only sees him at breakfast, where he arrives right on time and leaves early, leaving no room to talk. He doesn’t attend dinner at all, saying that he’s trying a new diet where he can’t eat at the evening. It’s a lie and everyone knows it, but he feels his father’s expectant gaze, leaving the matter to his hands.

But Wakatoshi doesn’t know what to do.

He stares at his ceiling in the dead of the night. Trying to think.

He can force an audience with Kei, but he has never had to do that before. He just knows that the blonde will be somewhere, and he’ll find him. Now, Kei is _making the effort_ to avoid him. And should he really disrespect that by forcing him to talk?

His eyebrows furrow, and something seems to rip in his chest. Not even a week into his marriage and it’s already falling apart.

It’s three weeks after the incident, and he’s finally contemplating barging in on Kei’s chambers in all seriousness.

Wakatoshi is staring at his ceiling, as he has been for all the nights that came prior, when the doors to his own chambers open. He sits up only to find Kei striding towards his bed and stopping at the edge.

He breaks down in tears.

The world is a cruel place. To him, and to everyone.

He has accepted this long ago when his older brother had tried to elope with the royal blacksmith, the man he loved. They were chased down the forest near the river, the blacksmith bleeding to death with an arrow lodged between his ribs. His brother was taken back to the castle, charged with treason. Those in the streets thought that royalty got away with everything, but his brother disrespected the kingdom, he disrespected the king — and the king had to impose his role. His brother was sentenced to death, and his body was shot with a burning arrow in the river.

The world truly is cruel, and Wakatoshi has accepted it. But acceptance doesn’t mean he’s without anger. He was angry at the world when he witnessed his brother’s fate, and he is angry at it again now, when he hears that it has put Kei through the same.

“His name was Tobio.” It’s whispered, a secret. Wakatoshi is the first one hearing about him in Shiratorizawa. “He was a knight, and he was highborn.”

He rubs the Kei’s back as he tells the story; squeezing but giving him enough space to talk as they lay in the bed. “He was infuriating, and bossy. He never had a problem calling me out on my shit. His peers, when he was a squire, called him Your Highness behind his back because that’s how insufferable he was.”

A pause. “I called him _King_ , when it was just us two.”

Kei takes a deep breath, and he just lets him.

“I loved him.” Wakatoshi felt a pang of _something_ , but he ignored it. It’s not about him right now. “He was highborn. So we were going to be okay. That’s what I thought. I’m a second child. I didn’t need to have a very political marriage, as long as I married among the upper nobility.”

Wakatoshi calms his nerves. He knows where this is going.

“When I got engaged—to you,” his voice chokes and the older wants to just embrace him and kiss all the pain off of his skin. But Kei is not done yet. He needs this. “We tried to get away. I wasn’t thinking. All I thought was I loved him. And I can’t if it’s not him.”

A tear falls off of Kei’s cheek. He wipes it away before Wakatoshi could.

“And he _died_.” The brunette finally pulls the younger to his chest as the tears flow. His voice is slightly muffled in Wakatoshi’s tunic but he hears him all the same. “I loved him, and he died. And _I_ didn’t die, because my father still needed me. How is that fair?”

It’s not. The world is a cruel place.

“And then three months later, I come here, and I meet you and—” He sucks in a huge breath. Wakatoshi rubs his back. “And then I just. Forget about him. I let myself be happy with you. And I’m married now.”

Kei’s arm snake and squeeze around his back. “I did that to him.”

“It’s not your fault.”

“No. I mean,” Kei pulls away an inch so his face is not buried in fabric. “What you did. I told him I loved him. The first time we had sex.”

 _Oh_.

“And when you did that, it sunk to me, that he’s dead and I’m married to a man I will also call King someday and I loved him and I—”

The younger pushed his chest and looked him in the eye. “I love you.”

More tears streamed down his face, and Wakatoshi doesn’t stop himself from kissing them this time. When his mouth leans down, Kei meets it. He swallows everything. Everything the other has to offer. The pain. The grief. The doubt.

The _love_.

Wakatoshi presses him to bed. He takes his time. Their fingers intertwine, and every whisper of love is returned. When they’re panting and sated and _filled_ , Wakatoshi squeezes his husband in an embrace, speaking words that have never been spoken before.

“You can still call me Wakatoshi.” He breathes it and it’s easy in their own world.

“What?” Kei squirms in his hold but he keeps him close.

“Even when I inherit the throne, you can still call me Wakatoshi. You don’t have to call me King.”

“But that’s—” Wakatoshi kisses him. It’s a just a press of lips but he hopes it conveys the message—the promise.

(Kei doesn’t say anything else. He squeezes the brunette back and they sleep in entangled limbs.

In the morning, Wakatoshi kisses Kei awake.)

Wakatoshi will someday be in a place where he can denounce the cruelty. And he plans to. For Kei. For him. For everyone.

If he could win Kei’s heart, then he can win against the world.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for making it to the end. I cannot believe I brought dishonor to the ushitsuki name like this. I shall repent. (Also, I'm sorry for k-wording Kageyama oh my god, if you wanna read a fic where he's happy please let me shamelessly plug my [osakage tooth-rotting fluff fic](https://archiveofourown.org/works/23912989) because it is something that I at least feel content about. I know I sound like I'm not okay because I'm not jk sdfsdkfja I just need to get over myself aaaaahh.)
> 
> day 4 prompts: victory | castle | ~~magic!au~~


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